Drox Operative, Soldak’s upcoming space-aged RPG, takes a new stance on RPGs and how you should play through them. Featuring several different races, both human and alien, and a vast number of dynamic galaxies for you to explore and battle in, Drox Operative certainly has a lot to offer in terms of content.

You are a Drox Operative, a ship-for-hire to work for the person who pays the best and one of the remnants of the long extinct Drox race’s Operative who were the deadliest starship commanders in the galaxy eons ago. Present day, you are a member of the Drox Operative guild that has somehow lived on throughout history. You play as a ship who navigates the galaxies searching for work, namely through quests given out by factions. The interesting part about Drox is that you are essentially given the choice of whose side you want to promote. You might be flying through a galaxy with multiple factions warring for power; your help with simple tasks could be the needle that tips the scale in someone’s favor, making you an extremely important factor in how your game experience will play out. With this said, it’s safe to say that no two experiences in Drox will be the same in any way.

Drox Operative Combat

Throughout your exploits in space you will explore planets, search space debris, and encounter countless enemies to destroy as you work to accomplish your quest at hand. Combat is relatively easy to master right away – it mostly relies on left clicking on your enemies until they’re dead. The trick to fighting, especially in large groups, is determining which of your enemies at hand are the largest threats and who can be ignored until you have the more important targets under control. After these fights you will find that some of the enemies may have dropped objects, which you can then pick up and install on your ship, upgrading defense, attack, speed, and many other attributes. You also have a chance to find ship parts when you search wreckage floating in your path or you might happen upon some event on a new planet that you can reap some rewards from. The interesting part about exploring new planets is that you may also yield new crew members in the process, and we all know having more crew members is never a bad thing until pay day comes, and yes, there is a time when you need to pay the salaries of those working aboard your vessel. The inherent ability to choose which attributes to upgrade is imperative for an RPG game, and from my hands on experience with this game, I can attest to the fact that you really can make your ship work how you want it to work. I tried out a couple different builds, but the one I landed on was heavily focused on dealing damage and being agile, as to be able to avoid incoming attacks. With the added leveling system, where you get experience from destroying enemies and completing quests, I was able to customize my ship’s play style extremely finely, making it work exactly as I envisioned it working. Now, I know for a fact that my build probably wasn’t the most effective because I had absolutely the bare minimum level of defenses, so I would be extremely easy to kill if I got stuck in a bind, but there lies the beauty of this game. You can make it what you want.

Stat points customize your play style.

In addition to all the other features Soldak has included in Drox Operative, they have also included a multiplayer mode where you can join with friends to work together to shape the future of the galaxies. If that wasn’t great by itself, Drox Operative will be available on both PC and Mac, so platform shouldn’t be a reason not to play with friends. Cooperative play will add a completely new level of play, allowing someone to be a damage dealing vessel while another can become a tankier, more defensively focused ship, soaking up damage, allowing his allies to focus only on destroying the incoming enemies. Currently in its beta stages, Drox Operative should be out relatively soon, though there is no definitive release date at the moment.

Mike Zrimsek

Currently attending school to get a degree in Computer Science, I am an avid gamer of many genres. While I may be busy with school and work, I spend most of my available free time either playing games or writing about them.